‘Where our Romano’s involved, who knows? The studio’s booked till noon, just to be on the safe side. As long as he doesn’t manage to eviscerate himself with that Parmesan cleaver, we should be finished by then.’

Lo Chef’s voice boomed out over the speakers set against the padded wall.

‘…sixteen litres of the finest, richest, freshest milk to make a single kilo of this, the Jupiter of cheeses lording it over the rabble of minor gods. And then as much as two years of completely natural ageing, according to traditions handed down over seven centuries of continuous production, with no artificial manipulation to influence the process…’

Delia walked over and kissed the director lightly on the forehead.

‘Do me a favour, Luciano. Keep him at it for at least another fifteen minutes. I’ll have to hose him down and mother him when it’s over, but I need a coffee first.’

‘No problem. If he goes all speedy and rushes through the rest of the script, I’ll just tell him he was a bit flat on a couple of bars of that Verdi aria and get him to repeat the whole thing.’

Delia smiled her thanks.

‘Hey, did you see that thing that Edgardo Ugo wrote about him in Il Prospetto?’ Luciano added. ‘Got him bang to rights, no? I laughed myself sick!’

Without answering, Delia went out to the corridor. Almost immediately her mobile started to chirp. She checked the screen and said ‘Damn!’ before answering.

‘Have you told him?’ the caller asked.

‘Not yet,’ she replied, ignoring the stairs down to the street. ‘He’s in one of those moods this morning. You know what he’s like when he’s taping.’

‘Delia, he’s going to find out sooner or later, probably within a few hours. The damn magazine is on the streets now. It’s essential that he hears the bad news from us. How are you going to spin it?’

Delia pushed open the door to the fire escape, blocking its automatic closing mechanism with her briefcase, and stepped out on to the metal platform.